7/31/2010 @ 10:00AM

The Top Secrets Of Executive Headhunters

With over 14 million Americans currently out of work and millions more on the prowl for a more marketable career path, job hunting skills are practically up there with shelter, food and water in terms of survival necessities. An impeccable resume, the well-chosen interview outfit and ability to graciously answer the toughest of interview questions seem to be all that stands between you and your dream job (or just your next steady paycheck).

But when days of sending resumes turn into weeks and months without a phone call or interview, it might be time to turn to a professional. Executive recruiters, or headhunters, have one mission: matching very specific, top-level talent with very specific, top-level job openings. They are the match-makers of the business world and they’re masters of their trade.

For the top echelon of business people in the country, headhunters are already on their trail, poised to alert them when an opportunity arises. For the rest of us, though, there are valuable tricks of the professional job-hunting trade that can be applied to our own career searches to maximize our prospects.

All About Results

“Companies aren’t in the business of creating jobs for people,” says executive recruiter Skip Freeman, “companies are in the business of making money.” With that in mind, Freeman, the author of Headhunter Hiring Secrets: The Rules of the Hiring Game Have Changed Forever! stresses that understanding a company’s motivation for hiring employees is paramount to landing a job in this tight market. “Companies hire people for two reasons: to make money or to save money.” The take-away for job hunters is to position themselves to do one or both.

How? By quantifying your work experience.

Both Freeman and Charley Polachi, an executive recruiter who works in the tech and clean technology sectors, say that being able to quantify your work at previous positions is a step to making yourself the best candidate. Freeman shares the anecdote of a chemist whose company had recently been downsized. “He had a great letter of recommendation from his company, but nothing was laid out in numbers. It mentioned that he had developed new products but was missing any concrete, quantified information.” By going back to the company and reworking his resume, the chemist was able to show that one product he worked on saved the company $300 million in costs while another brought in $1 million in new business. “That’s something that stands out where words don’t,” says Freeman, who suggests that all resumes stay away from the phrasing “responsible for ” Quantifiable data that show money saved or revenues produced, are what get the attention of both headhunters and hiring managers.

Supply & Demand

“A lot of people don’t understand how the dynamic of headhunting works,” says Polachi, whose firm, Polachi, has placed executives at NorthBridge Venture Capital, atg and Segway, among others. When it comes to the jobs market, you’ve got supply and demand. On the demand side of the market, a company needs to fill an executive position. On the supply side of the market, most job hunters will be willing to fill whatever position they can get.

However, if job-seekers adopt the mindset of a headhunter, her goal is first to identify a company’s demand–and once she is sure she can meet that demand, supply herself as a candidate.

Another way of looking at this golden rule of recruiting is to understand that a recruiter works for the company and not the job seeker. Although they may be in the business of matching employees to corporations, the headhunter is paid by the hiring company, their job is not to present just qualified candidates who could be groomed to perfection, but the absolute best-qualified candidates who could do the job today.

Executive recruiter Freeman likens himself to an investigative reporter in his capacity to identify the exact specifications his client is looking for in a candidate–and then going out and finding that person.

“No one is looking for a square peg in a round hole,” says Matthew Rothenberg of career listing site TheLadders. For a job-seeker, this mindset translates to scouring job listings for opportunities that aren’t simply “OK fits” but positions where you are an excellent candidate and know you could hit the ground running upon being hired.

Plan Your Attack

Freeman says that most candidates are guilty of “shotgunning” their job hunt. “They sit in front of a computer responding to posting after posting to get a hit.” His recruiting advice? Take a tip from the professionals and develop a plan of attack to target your job search and the hiring managers you want to reach.

With prior planning, Freeman says, job hunters at any level may land an interview–in six proactive steps.

Step One: Determine your value proposition. How can you make money or save money for a company?

Step Two: Recognize that companies are looking for people who can hit the ground running. Identify companies, departments and positions where your value proposition would have immediate impact. This will help you target prospects by identifying the demand.

Step Three: Use your own personal network as well as networking tools like ZoomInfo and LinkedIn to find people in your targeted companies. Call them. Introduce yourself and learn about company culture through casual conversation.

Step Four: Develop a one-sheet, direct mail piece and send it Certified Mail. This document should include bullet points of what you can bring to the company and why. (Freeman adds that adding a postscript to a one-sheet has been shown to increase readership by up to 75% –The postscript should include the date and time that you will call to follow up.)

Step Five: Call at the appointed time to follow up.

Step Six: Make contact once a week over the course of 10 weeks–to send a relevant news link or other piece of valuable information. This will keep your name–and value–to the hiring manager.

These six steps are Freeman’s outline for getting his top-notch candidates into the interview chair.

During the interview, it’s your responsibility to communicate your value proposition to the hiring manager. Finally, You must communicate three things: you can do the job, you want the job and you are a cultural fit for the job.